Popular TV host Hu Gua (胡瓜) and his ex-wife Hsiu Hsiu (秀秀) have been on frosty terms since their divorce nearly a decade ago, but the cold front may finally be dissipating.
The former couple’s daughter, Hu Ying-chen (胡盈禎), recently celebrated her birthday at a restaurant in Taipei’s East District (東區) with her mom and egregious plastic surgeon husband Lee Chin-liang (李進良). Hu Gua and his current love Ting Ro-an (丁柔安) were noticeably absent. Gossip reporters asked if the two were “afraid to show up” because of the long-standing tension between Hu Gua and Hsiu Hsiu. Hu Ying-chen explained that she planned to have dinner with her father and Ting soon. Her mother added, “if they are willing to invite me along, then I will go” — a statement Apple Daily called no less than “astonishing.”
Hu and Hsiu Hsiu divorced in 2001. He and Ting have recently been spotted dining with his daughter and her husband. But while the relationship between Hu’s daughter and his girlfriend appears cordial enough, gossip rags report that tension surfaced this summer when Ying-chen allegedly tried to engineer a reunion between her mother and father. At her birthday dinner, Ying-chen let slip that she wanted to celebrate with her mother first before meeting up with her dad and Ting.
Hsiu Hsiu, however, said she’d be happy to tag along to the second dinner, adding that “it’s been 10 years, what’s past is past.” When questioned by an Apple reporter, Hu Gua responded “of course” he’d be happy to see his ex-wife. Whether the reunion will come to fruition or if the two former spouses will just continue to play a game of telephone via gossip reporters remains to be seen.
While the focus this week was on the thawing of the cold war between Hu Ying-chen’s parents, Apple couldn’t help poking fun at husband Lee, who is currently on an enforced three-month sabbatical after being found guilty of illegally inserting silicone breast implants into a patient. Lee, who is also rumored to be a serial philanderer, looked a bit “high” at the party, the newspaper reported, with bright red, glazed-over eyes. When someone asked him how often he “fries rice” (炒飯), a euphemism for sex (presumably just with his wife), he replied giggling “twice a week!”
Far less open to publicity than the Hu family is Ady Ann (安以軒). The actress and singer once enjoyed a reputation for being a buttoned-down daddy’s girl, but has “unfolded like a peach blossom” with a series of alleged affairs, our sister newspaper the Liberty Times noted. Ann has been romantically linked to F4 member and actor Vanness Wu (吳建豪) and H. Brothers Media (華誼兄弟) head Wang Zhonglei (王中磊).
Two months ago, Ann was spotted strolling to a hot pot restaurant in heavy rain with a tall man who held an umbrella over her the entire way. A reporter saw the duo again last week while they were out shopping. “On closer inspection, it appears that Ann’s new boyfriend is Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Hsieh Kuo-liang’s (謝國樑) former aide, Chang Po-chin (張卜今),” wrote the Liberty Times. Upon learning that Chang’s identity had been uncovered, Ann wailed over the telephone to a reporter, “I’m going to cry now!
“We really are just friends. In the future, we might do business together,” she added through what the Liberty Times wrote sounded like tearful sniffling.
In addition to his political activities, Hsieh is known for his six-year relationship with Breeze Center (微風廣場) art director, Michelle Liao (廖曉喬), the sister of the luxury mall’s owner, and was recently photographed going home with a “hot chick” (辣妹) to “watch a DVD.” But Chang’s record now tops that of his former boss, the Liberty Times remarked. He is rumored to have had an affair with children’s television host and singer Momo Chu (朱安禹) while still a player with the Super Basketball League’s Yulon Dinos (裕隆恐龍).
Taiwan has next to no political engagement in Myanmar, either with the ruling military junta nor the dozens of armed groups who’ve in the last five years taken over around two-thirds of the nation’s territory in a sprawling, patchwork civil war. But early last month, the leader of one relatively minor Burmese revolutionary faction, General Nerdah Bomya, who is also an alleged war criminal, made a low key visit to Taipei, where he met with a member of President William Lai’s (賴清德) staff, a retired Taiwanese military official and several academics. “I feel like Taiwan is a good example of
March 2 to March 8 Gunfire rang out along the shore of the frontline island of Lieyu (烈嶼) on a foggy afternoon on March 7, 1987. By the time it was over, about 20 unarmed Vietnamese refugees — men, women, elderly and children — were dead. They were hastily buried, followed by decades of silence. Months later, opposition politicians and journalists tried to uncover what had happened, but conflicting accounts only deepened the confusion. One version suggested that government troops had mistakenly killed their own operatives attempting to return home from Vietnam. The military maintained that the
“M yeolgong jajangmyeon (anti-communism zhajiangmian, 滅共炸醬麵), let’s all shout together — myeolgong!” a chef at a Chinese restaurant in Dongtan, located about 35km south of Seoul, South Korea, calls out before serving a bowl of Korean-style zhajiangmian —black bean noodles. Diners repeat the phrase before tucking in. This political-themed restaurant, named Myeolgong Banjeom (滅共飯館, “anti-communism restaurant”), is operated by a single person and does not take reservations; therefore long queues form regularly outside, and most customers appear sympathetic to its political theme. Photos of conservative public figures hang on the walls, alongside political slogans and poems written in Chinese characters; South
Taipei Mayor Chiang Wan-an (蔣萬安) announced last week a city policy to get businesses to reduce working hours to seven hours per day for employees with children 12 and under at home. The city promised to subsidize 80 percent of the employees’ wage loss. Taipei can do this, since the Celestial Dragon Kingdom (天龍國), as it is sardonically known to the denizens of Taiwan’s less fortunate regions, has an outsize grip on the government budget. Like most subsidies, this will likely have little effect on Taiwan’s catastrophic birth rates, though it may be a relief to the shrinking number of